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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24079873">i'm not sure if i want you to save me</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Princex_N/pseuds/Princex_N'>Princex_N</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>making strange with one another [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marble Hornets</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst, Gen, Guilt, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Medication, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Sickfic, Vomiting</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 21:07:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,187</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24079873</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Princex_N/pseuds/Princex_N</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>side effects may vary</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>making strange with one another [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1711201</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>i'm not sure if i want you to save me</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>title from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf2m4QquSxE">the airborne toxic event's song 'poor isaac'</a></p>
<p>warning for bad mental space and vomiting; this doesn't have any significant plot points if you want to just skip it</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Alex knows that he deserves worse than this. </p>
<p>He's stuck on the couch of the new apartment (they say it was for Brian, but Alex knows the only reason they're not still in that godawful house is because he wasn't the only one too haunted by the threat of empty rooms and long hallways to get any sleep), riding out nausea with a cheap bucket at his side because the new medication does not agree with him and he doesn't really have a choice about taking it. </p>
<p>He's still not entirely sure why he's been going along with Tim's plan to keep them all together and corralled. He knows they all hate him (and knows they have reason to, Alex had known and known it was worth it, but was it?) and doesn't know why they're going along with it either. Jay is equal parts skittishly avoidant and stubbornly spiteful, Tim keeps using the excuse of work as the only thing that keeps him from roaming the rooms with angry haunted eyes, and Brian is a mess of rage and panicked violence only kept in check by the broken bones and braces. They all watch him with wary eyes and prey heartbeats and Alex wants to snarl at them but doesn't, because some pathetic part of him doesn't want to make things worse. </p>
<p>He should do it anyway. Making things worse is all Alex has ever been good at.</p>
<p>He can feel Brian's eyes on him, and ignores them. There's not much for them to do except glare at each other and pretend like they can't see each other, and Alex is too wrung out to deal with the staring right now. Some part of him can appreciate the stillness, some part of him wants that purpose back. Something to do and something to <em>fix</em> this aching broken mess fate and monsters left them with. Maybe it wasn't fixing, maybe it was lies and manipulation and twisted fear, but it was <em>something. </em>He misses it as much as he doesn't. He knows he's not supposed to. </p>
<p>(But if he doesn't miss it, if he doesn't go back to it, if he doesn't give in and carry things through and end his role in the crusade with a gun to his head, then what was the <em>point? </em>Empty eyes and red stained blonde hair and she never saw it coming but that never made it better. What was the <em>point</em>.) </p>
<p>The nausea reaches a crescendo, twisting in his stomach, and Alex rolls over to grope for the bucket just in time. Gags and retches and relishes the burn of vomit in his throat and knows that he deserves worse than this. </p>
<p>It takes a while for the heaving and choking up mouthfuls of acid to stop, and his muscles ache even as the nausea fades and Alex almost hates it. Fights the urge to go find the bottle with his name printed across it because as much as he wants to stop all of this and never have to take it again, he almost wants to take it as often as possible - an excuse to hurt himself masquerading as a cure. </p>
<p>He doesn't. He's not supposed to. He lays there for a while and pushes back the exhaustion threatening to swallow him, because as much as being sick keeps him up at night he doesn't get to rest yet. No one else is going to be the one to clean up after him and he wouldn't want any of them to anyway. Can feel Brian's eyes on him, hear Jay somewhere in the distance. Alex lets the quiet sit only for a moment, and then pushes himself up to his feet. </p>
<p>Dizziness spots his vision but he ignores it, it's been tearing through him on and off and he's getting better at ignoring it, breathing shallow through his mouth because there's nothing left in his stomach if he pukes again and he doesn't want the hassle of dry heaving. He picks up the bucket and stumbles to the bathroom, washes out the thin acid in the bathtub and lets tap water from the sink turn sickly sweet in his mouth. </p>
<p>His head is starting to hurt. He doesn't look at himself in the mirror. He knows the others are put off by all of this, by him. Talking to each other and wondering (Tim and Jay are, at least. Brian isn't talking to anyone), but Alex knows it's not what they think. That <em>thing</em> had liked him but it never owned him, and Alex just has bad luck and a new awareness of a conscience guilty enough to not fight it. He doesn't open the cabinet to take another pill because it isn't time yet, and ignores the slim shadow in the back room as he takes the bucket back to the couch.</p>
<p>Brian watches as he lays back down, and Alex ignores him. It would be insufferable to sit under the weight of his eyes if some part of him wasn't comforted by it (Brian can't stand on his own, still can't walk, but Alex still thinks of "YOU WILL NEVER BE FORGIVEN" and "HE WILL LEAD ME TO YOU" and "SMILE FOR DEATH", and settles in the knowledge that <em>someone</em> would be willing to put him down if he turned out too rabid a dog to keep). It helps as much as it doesn't that the feeling is so familiar.</p>
<p>He doesn't get a water bottle from the fridge to clear the ache in his throat, doesn't try to find something in the kitchen that his stomach can handle, because he doesn't want to bother and hasn't earned it besides. He's already stumbling with fatigue and dizziness and doesn't want to risk a fall when there's other people around to catch the weakness. </p>
<p>Instead he sprawls out on the couch to ride out the ache in his head (and he is not comforted by the familiarity of the pain, he is <em>not)</em>. Pretends he can't see Jay watching from the shadows, pretends he can't see Brian taking in every detail with careful relish. Doesn't let himself shift in pain when the little discomforts of his body build and build into something so overwhelming he wants to claw at his skin to free himself. Chews on his fingers until the skin splits beneath his teeth in an attempt to soothe some part of himself that he knows will never be settled. </p>
<p>It'll probably get easier. He'll probably adjust and get used to things and the side effects will fade and leave only the cures, things will probably get better in whatever ways they can. The only place you can go from rock bottom is up. </p>
<p>Alex still won't be surprised when he wakes up a few hours after taking the next scheduled dose, given just enough time to stumble to the bathroom and kneel in front of the toilet, gagging up ichor and memories and whatever dinner he was able to choke down with thin reedy moans. </p>
<p>He knows that he deserves worse than that, after all. </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>my rheumatologist has me on a new med that's fucking me up; alex is the only one who never took the medication in canon so he's the one i could give side effects to without worrying about continuity - the operator really isn't causing any of this</p>
<p>also do y'all have requests for this series? i never make guarantees, but i do like to ask :3</p></blockquote></div></div>
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